


Of the Dead

by PipesFlowForeverandEver



Series: Hymns of Struggle [14]
Category: Bendy and the Ink Machine
Genre: 80 years is a long time, AU ending, Alternate Ending, Alternate Universes, An alteration to my Hymns of Struggle AU in which another Joey fixes everything, Family, Family Feels, Gingie's son is henry and presumed long dead, Male Friendship, adopted family, dia de los muertos, hymns of struggle, they have to live with the aftermath and trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-09 06:40:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17996828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PipesFlowForeverandEver/pseuds/PipesFlowForeverandEver
Summary: After all he's done... After all the evil he wrought upon those he loved most...how could he possibly deserve a happy ending?How could he ever be trusted to love again?(An alternate ending to the Hymns of Struggle AU, in combination with an AU AceofIntuition and I have together where our Joeys met before Gingie (my Joey) destroyed his studio. Knowing the main story might be helpful for some details but not at all required to enjoy this drabble.)





	Of the Dead

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AceofIntuition](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceofIntuition/gifts).



> **A WARNING:** This is spoilery for the most recent chapters of the AU but not for the ending to come. Feel free to read if you either don't care about spoilers for the latest 6-so chapters or if you're caught up. This can also be read on its own without reading the main series if you so wish, as I've explained a lot of details either below or within the drabble itself.
> 
> Ace and I have been interacting for a long time and have devised countless AUs involving their Joey (Snowy) and mine (Gingie). The usual story is that they both became skilled enough at magic to find each other in other dimensions, and more often than not after many strenuous moments, they become best friends. I pay about as much attention to these AUs as I do the main story I write (in canon absent of multiverses), but I'm so delighted to share it with my best friend that it's about dang time I made something to share with y'all. 
> 
> Ace is my beta reader and a giant inspiration to me in general, and Snowy's interactions with Gingie have helped me develop his personality beyond belief. As such, I'm gifting this drabble and alternate ending to them.
> 
> In this AU, Hymns of Struggle prior to Francine's visit is canon, but Snowy comes instead. In his time, he hadn't been able to contact Gingie for a few months, but of course for Gingie about 80 years had passed. Snowy manages to undo the curse upon Gingie's studio and takes him back to Snowy's relatively normal, safe and modern world and adopts him into the family unit. Snowy has a wife named Ana and a daughter named Joy, both of whom Gingie adores.
> 
> Gingie attempts to reconcile his feelings, rediscovering those he had for Snowy and his family after so much time...as well as struggling with love reentering his life even after effectively abandoning his own family and hurting everyone he loved.

He had been around it before, but not so close. Not so intimate. But, of course, it was inevitable now that he was a member of the family. The Drews, too, hoped this Día de los Muertos would do him some good.

Gingie looked in soft awe at the candles lighting up the otherwise modern home, the colors of all the flowers and cheery Mexican décor bouncing onto the walls, windows, and his pale, rosy skin. Pink that splashed onto his glasses shifted to blue with a single step, making a clear path as Joy ran from the hall and to the altar room. A weary voice still had grateful strength for a chuckle as the small girl skidded to a halt, a face maybe eternally tired still feeling it odd to smile. It faded, however, as the child stared at him, and he could almost feel his heart stopping.

Regardless of whether or not she really thought it in her naïve but brilliant young mind, the man that was only known as Joey for 80-some years was wondering if sometimes the child of his best friend had trouble recognizing him anymore. Such reminders in her wide-eyed stares made him feel vulnerable- certainly not in a way he could blame her for, but in fact only blame himself.

Snowy had mentioned it once or twice before how…small the old ginger looked- without his sharp-angled coat, tall hat, and slight, clicking heels. Somehow it had hardly been a blink in Snowy’s dimension- a few months, in fact- and so the change was not so subtle when the blue-eyed dad found his beloved other. Almost a century rotting alone, being forced to kill the people he held most dear over and over again, day after day.

Snowy didn’t have to wonder why he was so different, but the man himself couldn’t deny that the shift itself from hell to heaven seemed to change Ginger on its own.

It was clearest, as mentioned, in how he appeared in the physical world. His shoulders were rounded in soft, rounded sweaters, and a chest used to vibrant threads now often sported only dark or brown. Fancy pants were traded for sweats, and Joey had to learn how to tie and untie tennis shoes. The eyes Snowy found glimmering like gold in the darkness of the ink were rescued, but they still seemed to stain the underneath of eyelids. Gingie never slept while he was in the studio- either not at all or not once properly on a bed- and so Snowy wondered if he would ever adjust to the best pillows and mattresses money could buy. The old man would often fall asleep at the table and stay up all night in bed, and it was something his friend simply had to learn to tolerate.

But although sometimes children are accidentally the most cruel in the way they notice things, they maybe more often can be the kindest. And so Joy didn’t say a word about how different her tio seemed- only knew what she wanted from him.

The smile hesitantly returned to him as he saw the child raise her arms and hum in a demanding pout.

“What is it darling?” Joey’s words had often been soft for Joy, but as Snowy and Ana watched from the other side of the room, they both were fully aware he hadn’t been anything but soft in all the time he was here. The volume and vibrance was gone, and Snowy especially listened with perked ears for tinges of it to leak back into his language, yearning for the brightest person in the multiverse to take Snowy’s world as his stage once again.

Joy simply grumbled again before rocking onto her toes, arms outstretched. _“Up,_ Tio Gin!!!”

Her mom and dad shared a meaningful glance as the girl’s beloved uncle bent down and hoisted her up in his arms. The glitter in her crystal irises seemed to light his right up, too, smile now even showing some teeth.

And as he bounced her, perhaps the breathlessness Snowy perceived was related to what Gingie suddenly felt; the familiarity overwhelming. The weight in his arms, tiny hands gripping against his shirt- the way the fabric wrinkled and pulled in her little fingers-

The room was spinning, and so Gingie passed the girl off to her nearby mother without a single word, silently and quickly stepping out of the room.

Another, more concerned glance shared by Mr. and Mrs. Drew, their eyes wide and mouths slightly ajar.

“Tio’s bein’ weird,” their daughter interrupted, speaking truth in its purest form. Snowy looked past the marigolds in the doorway and then back to his wife before going after their adopted family, unsure what to say but sure he had to say something.

“Gin?” Snowy called down the hall as he turned the corner, tilting his body while hanging onto the edge of the wall. Past a slight bounce in his black hair he spotted a more distant movement, Gingie just leaving his sight.

 _“Gin!”_ He was a patient man for Gingie, and so the sharpness in his tone was not scolding but concerned- to get his attention. As he followed, footsteps moved from his level to above the head, and so he trailed after, trying to subdue his own thoughts going wild with worry. And indeed it was hard work to stop his heart from falling so hard to the floor he could trip on it as in the slight distance, he heard someone begin to cry.

Beyond Gingie’s knees, the door cracked open to a Snowy panting and urgent- but seeing him there? Like this? It reminded him even more to calm down. The taller man took a deep breath and centered himself in order to approach the shorter one on the floor.

The once confident redhead that knew how to make any sobbing child grin was now doing so himself, bundling himself in the corner of his new bedroom, knees to his chest and a bounce every so often from his spine to accompany cries he tried to quiet. His 130-year-old fingers gripped against cloth as old as a newborn baby as he was wrapped with feelings that didn’t belong about him not belonging too.

“Gin…” Snowy murmured, kneeling down onto the carpet beside him with a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Gin, what is it…?”

The man who hadn’t been called that in a very, very long time seemed to wrap himself up a little more, shook a little more, and so it filled the silence and Snowy’s lungs so that all the younger fellow could do was wrap his arms around the other and hold him close.

Snowy closed his eyes and listened to him cry, perhaps not noticing as it got quieter and quieter until it was almost nothing.

“…Snowy.”

And they opened again, grip loosing to allow gin to sit up a bit better and look him in the eye if he so chose. He did, Gingie’s head tilting up to show red-stained eyes and a lip still quivering, even if it wasn’t sobbing anymore.

It shook simply from what it was planning to say.

_“I miss her.”_

No clarification was needed, not with the way it cut Snowy in two like that.

Gingie hadn’t said it before, not like this, but it was inevitable. Snowy should have known that the weight on his friend’s eyes whenever he saw Joy- the way they followed her across the room and noticed every little thing she did and treasured it- it had to have reminded him of Linda. Both how Linda was- the tiny, beautiful thing- as well as what she might have started to be if only her grandpa had been allowed to see her grow up.

One way or another, that was gone forever. Gingie couldn’t return to his dimension again after the curse, and even if he could, the baby he once held in his arms must be so old she could have long been dead.

Snowy didn’t even have to scrape against the idea of something like this happening to him and his own daughter in order for it to make him feel sick to his stomach.

And so Snowy, overwhelmed himself with nothing to say, bundled the man in his arms- the man seemingly made to bundle himself the granddaughter he adored, and maybe more children that were intended to come. He felt the tender, pained cries muffle into his shirt as Gingie finally squeezed him back and stained his clothes with tears.

Gingie, the other man believed, had been standing on his own two feet for far too long. He was more than willing to carry him wherever he went for the rest of their lives.

* * *

“Tio Gingie?”

His head turned to his darling niece. He noticed the way the wool scruffed against his neck; he had been so keenly aware of the different textures and touches in his life after their absence for longer than he should have been alive.

There was a bit of silence between the two smallest members of the family for a second, Joy swinging their arms a bit as hand was held in hand. Before them adorned with the most gorgeous things Gingie had ever seen was the altar, candles and flowers and pictures of deceased family they wished well hung up to be admired and remembered forevermore.

The sacred atmosphere might have cut conversation for a bit, but Joy eventually was able to roll her eyes and pull in her bottom lip before speaking.

“Who is that?”

Gingie followed her point with his gaze, giving a soft chuckle. “That’s my family.”

She seemed to understand, but only briefly accepted before insisting for more wisdom.

“W’ the baby.”

She pointed again, and Gingie- facing her- saw in his peripheral who in particular she meant.

Another chuckle, perhaps simply a soft inhale that pinched underneath his eyes.

“That’s my son,” he whispered.

“No, it isn’t!”

And his head whipped around about as slowly as one could to that.

“Th- that has to be older,” she tried to explain, using the logic available to her, the child judging the age of the photo and correctly deciding something was amiss. “He can’t be older than you if you’re papa. Papas are older than sons!”

His eyes flickered over her. No Snowy and Ana around this time to scoop her away so Gingie could recuperate from his trauma. But he could handle it.

“That’s right, my dear,” he murmured again, and a smirk grew upon his face with the faintest hint of mischief. “But I’m far older than I look. Thrice as old as I was when you first met me.”

Joy scrunched her face up at this riddle, another solid fact coming to mind. “You can’t be _old!_ You’re a papa and papas aren’t old!”

He tilted his head, pondering what to say next with a look to the ceiling before settling with a simple, quiet, “What if I said I was anyway?”

“I’m gonna tell papa you’re _fibbin’!”_

And that grin upon his face widened so so far that it put tears in his eyes. Pushing back his own pain, he remained silly for his beloved niece- just as he would have for a granddaughter her age. “You wouldn’t!”

“Uhuh!” the tiny girl challenged. But just as suddenly, she began to forcefully pull at his soft sleeve, stretching the fabric out. Gingie felt himself bounce back and forth with each tug, the way his shirt snapped against his wrist.

“…What is it…my dear?” the truly ancient man asked gently.

“M’ gonna take you to the mirror!” she declared, tugging yet again, “Show that you’re not old!”

Another croak in his throat akin to a laugh, a buried one digging its way out after forgetting how to be sincerely, genuinely happy. The humbled man once a god allowed the child to pull him away, leaving the space in front of the altar empty with the paper photos moving with the slight wind of an open window as their steps grew fainter and fainter. Next to the dead and loved family of the Drews were those of another Drew, a photo of his mother in a rocking chair above a yellowed, torn black-and-white photograph of his son, his son’s husband, and their beautiful baby girl.

**Author's Note:**

> For the hell of it, here's some art Ace has done of our Joeys together with various sorts of AUs (including the favorite Minty/fusion AU). I adore them:
> 
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/182647947573/were-ok  
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/182020268203/some-various-au-sketches-with-snowy-and  
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/179333866008/the-usual-stream-nonsense-pipesflowforeverandever  
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/179260801278/who-am-i-why-nothing-less-than-the  
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/178902204473/i-dont-have-time-to-do-the-inktober-today  
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/178871211763/bendy-and-the-inktober-machine-day-8-wandering  
> https://pipesflowforeverandever.tumblr.com/post/182503222743/minty-fairy  
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/175022949445/an-outfit-swap-was-highly-demanded-at-the-last  
> https://pipesflowforeverandever.tumblr.com/post/182062519993/what-is-snowys-spirit-animal-if-i-had-to-guess
> 
> These are Gingie with Snowy's family:
> 
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/179668604408/happy-belated-halloween-from-snowys-weird  
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/post/177145704283/part-2-of-vacation-shenanigans-in-which-joy
> 
> Actually if you would rather just see All of the Gingie and Snowy interactions, they're most of the content in this tag here:
> 
> http://aceofintuition.tumblr.com/tagged/ginger+drew+ale


End file.
